Marju Broder wrote to EWR with the goal of letting the global community know about Väärtnõu’s latest project. Knowledge is never to be rejected; assumptions should be approached with caution. As a reader service, and considering that Buddhism is gently acquired through long-term experiential growth, this is offered verbatim as received, with the encourament to follow up on the sources as desired. There are things in existence to be gained. [ed]

Väärtnõu presented recently the topic of Chinese Buddhist Encyclopedia on a world top conference in Berkeley University in December 7-9, 2012.

The news has been broadcasted earlier in China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Mongolia and elsewhere even before he actually started his project.

The project itself is about creating a world wide online database on Chinese Buddhism, - History, - Culture, - Events, etc. The main emphasis will be on China and Chinese, but there will be no restrictions in adding other articles in fields of Buddhism, Oriental Science and History, Sinology, Tibetology, Anthropology, etc.

The true aim is to create an online source of knowledge for those who are interested. Using Internet the access will be worldwide and for free. The work is initially carried out in Chinese and in English.

Lama VanTao is also the author and organizer of many events. For example he has organized annual academic Buddhism conferences in Europe and Australia, which have become very popular amongst academics, Buddhist monks and lay people. The Buddhist conferences are necessary for the top peak of academic and traditional Buddhists to develop understanding and ideas on how to develop and carry on ancient teachings in the 21st century.

Lama VanTao himself is a significant person in terms of modernising Buddhist teaching and making them more available. For example he was the first person who ever started drawing traditional Buddhist paintings with computer design. He created his first online Buddhist Encyclopedia in 2005 in Europe, which has been a great success.

He is also well known as a builder of traditional Buddhist architecture. He has built temples, stupas, prayer wheels, statues. He says he will hopefully continue the tradition of creating Buddhist physical marks in Australia.

Coming back to the current project- Chinese Buddhist Encyclopedia, Lama VanTao says that the his aim is to create a trustworthy source of knowledge, which would be accessible by everyone for free.
Therefore, the work is carried in English and Chinese, two most spoken languages.

There are many international organizations and specialists who are already involved in the project from around the globe. For example the National University of Taiwan, HuaFan University, Dharma Drum from Taiwan, Beijing University and others. Väärtnõu will rely on those associates to contribute unique materials, technical advice, editing, etc.

It has taken Lama Väärtnõu many years to accumulate knowledge and merits to starts such a big project. Now he has officially started it and the base of the project will be Australia.

In Australia The Chinese Buddhist Encyclopaedia project was firstly introduced at the 2nd international conference "Buddhism & Australia" that will took place on 23-25 January, 2013 in Perth

Here is the link for the website-
http://www.chinabuddhismencycl...

The website contains already over 2500 articles and although it was started a few weeks ago.

By publishing this news/article we hope to find and connect with those who are interested in the project and being involved. It would be a great contribution and much appreciated. The project is 100% non-for-profit activity.

MARJU BRODER


PS: Here are some recent published articles:

www.epl.eehttp://www.epl.ee/news/eesti/vello-vaartnou-esitles-oma-uut-teadusprojekti-hiina-budismi-entsukolpeediat-tippkonverentsil-berkeley-ulikoolis-usa-s.d?id=65585262
http://www.chinamedia.com/news...
http://newlotus.buddhistdoor.c...
http://www.news.com.au/top-sto...
http://focustaiwan.tw/ShowNews...
Berkeley conference: http://www.pnclink.org/pnc2012... )

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